Quote:All-Star Game TV ratings up 37 percent from last season
Posted Feb 21 2011 2:42PM

NEW YORK (AP) -- The NBA All-Star game has earned its highest television rating since Michael Jordan's last appearance in 2003.

The Western Conference's 148-143 win Sunday night on TNT featuring a duel between Kobe Bryant and LeBron James drew a 5.2 rating. That's up 37 percent from last year, part of a season of strong ratings for a league bursting with intriguing story lines.

Ratings measure the percentage of all homes with televisions tuned into a program.

YouTube is in talks with "most pro sports leagues" – including European football leagues – about securing live broadcasting rights, according to Brian Suh, Google's head of YouTube partnerships at its Korean division.

The world's No 1 video-sharing website sees live sports broadcasting as a way to keep viewers on its site for longer periods of time, increasing its value to advertisers.

Google has signed up two high-profile media executives, former Netflix boss Robert Kyncl and Universal Sports chief Claude Ruibal, in recent months aimed at boosting its movie and sports video.

YouTube's first season of broadcasting the IPL brought in more than 55m visits from 250 countries, and proved to sports leagues that live online streaming "is something that's possible", said Gautam Anand, Google director of content partnerships for Asia Pacific.

"It's fair to say that there will be a lot more appealing sports content you'll see on YouTube. We have conversations with pretty much everyone. One of the good things about the IPL was that it proved to a lot of sports leagues that [the] broad-scale livestreaming type of exercise is something that's possible," he added.

"They took notice of the IPL and have come to us, and entered into a lot more serious discussions."

YouTube and the IPL split the revenue from sponsorship and advertising in the two-year deal, which broadcasts in every country outside of the US.

US broadcasters ABC, ESPN and TNT have four years remaining on their contracts with the NBA. ESPN currently owns the rights to broadcast NBA highlights online.

Anand declined to comment on the details of Google's discussions with the two US sports leagues over a YouTube deal on Monday.

Quote:Carmelo Anthony debut was highest-rated regular season Knicks game on MSG in 16 years Posted by Inside Hoops Feb 24

Last night’s New York Knicks-Milwaukee Bucks game on MSG Network, featuring the Knicks debut of All-Star Carmelo Anthony, scored a whopping 6.75 household Nielsen rating (507,285 households) to become the highest-rated regular season Knicks game on MSG in 16 years.

The game narrowly missed topping Michael Jordan’s famous “Double Nickel” game from March 28, 1995 (6.78 HH) when Jordan scored 55 points in his return to Madison Square Garden after his first retirement from the NBA.

The game easily surpassed this season’s previous high of a 3.61 HH rating for the Knicks-Celtics game on December 15, 2010. Last night’s game also beat MSG and ESPN’s combined HH rating of 6.27 for that Knicks-Celtics matchup.

“Last night’s Knicks game was a defining moment at The Garden, and the production team translated that into a stunning experience on television for more than half a million fans watching at home,” said Mike Bair, president, MSG Media.

The game registered season-high numbers in every measurable demo, specifically the key M18-34 demo which scored an 8.42 HH rating that more than doubled this season’s previous high of a 4.06 HH rating for the Knicks-Lakers game on January 9, 2011. The quarter-hour high for the game was an 8.20 HH rating between 10:00-10:15 p.m.

Through 52 games on MSG Network this season, the Knicks are averaging a 1.62 HH rating, up 60% over last season at this time (1.01 HH). The Knicks are also averaging a 2.30 rating in the M18-34 demo, up 147% over last season at this time (0.93 M18-34).

The Knicks travel to Cleveland on Friday to face the Cavaliers at 7:30 p.m. and then to Miami on Sunday to take on the Heat at 8:00 p.m. Both games will be telecast live on MSG Network, and will be preceded by “Knicks Game Night” 30 minutes prior to tip-off.